The NFL playoffs are on hiatus this week in preparation for next weekend’s Super Bowl 49 between the New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks. In the meantime, the NFL’s media following has latched on to a controversial story stemming from the AFC Championship game between New England and Indianapolis.

It all started when accusations of tampering emerged from the Indianapolis Colts camp after their embarrassing 47-7 defeat in Foxbouragh last Sunday. ESPN’s Chris Mortensen gave credence to the allegations when he reported that, upon investigation, 11 footballs were indeed found to be under-inflated.

The New England Patriots have had several high profile brushes with the NFL’s stringent rules committee. In 2007, head coach Bill Belichick faced a massive amount of scrutiny when the league discovered he was covertly taping strategic procedures of opposing teams. Given his team’s three Super Bowl victories in the preceding years, it was only natural that the media would question the authenticity of his success. Apparently Belichick had been engaging in the practice since 2000, although the league only declared the practice to be forbidden in September 2006.

FiveThirtyEight’s Neil Paine delved deep into the complex world of Las Vegas odds and statistics in order to determine whether New England actually gleamed an advantage from their alleged rule breaking. His results were largely inconclusive, finding that Belichick’s teams scored an average of only 2.4 more points before being outed for “Spygate.”

In 2008, former star running back Marshall Faulk speculated that the Patriots may have filmed his team’s final practice before their Super Bowl matchup in 2001. Though he had no proof, Faulk went on to suggest that “some of the best things that are done in sports are illegal.  You work around the rules and try to get things done.”

A few professional quarterbacks have weighed in on the “Deflate Gate” matter, including Heisman trophy winner Matt Leinart. The former USC Trojan star remarked that “every team tampers with footballs,” fueling speculation that this may be a non issue. Super Bowl winning quarterback Brad Johnson openly admits that he paid ball boys to scuff footballs before the championship game in 2003. However, Johnson insists that both he and opposing quarterback Rich Gannon preferred to throw roughed up balls that were not brand new or slick.

On Thursday, New England quarterback Tom Brady faced the media to respond to the Deflate Gate controversy. He seemed genuinely perplexed at all the commotion, calmly denying that he was responsible for having the balls deflated.  Brady explained that his equipment crew has a process that entails “breaking the balls in,” which is not against the rules.

However, the assembled media was quick to follow up with a barrage of pointed questions, implicating Brady and the Patriots in yet another cheating scandal. A full scale league investigation is underway, and critics will be lining up to scold the NFL if they allow a team guilty of cheating to compete for a championship. Regardless of the outcome or potential consequences levied against New England, it is clear that the pressure of Deflate Gate  is not going down anytime soon.